Mars Apocalypse: Was Life On The Red Planet Wiped Out By Global Warming?

It is still a mystery for many scientists and average people alike if there was ever life on Mars. Now, scientists suggest that life, if there were any, on the Red Planet may have been wiped out because of a massive drought.

An international team of researchers at the University of Stirling in Scotland says that despite the Red Planet being wet and habitable more than 3 billion years ago, Mars was wet and habitable. However, recent findings show how dry the planet's current environment is, hinting it could not support life in the future.

"For life to exist in the areas we investigated, it would need to find pockets far beneath the surface, located away from the dryness and radiation present on the ground," Dr. Christian Schröder, Lecturer in Environmental Science and Planetary, said in a press release by the University of Stirling.

Global Warming Might Have Wiped Out Martians

The researchers believed that Mars has water-carved features. Since water provides the conditions needed to support life, then there could have been living organisms on the planet billions of years ago, The Sun reports.

If there were any, however, it could have been wiped out by global warming and the changing climate. The buildup of greenhouse gases in the dense atmosphere of the Red Planet suggests that it could have developed from dramatic climate cycles.

What They Found

They used data from the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity and analyzed a group of meteorites at Meridiani Planum, a plan found on the southern part of the planet's equator. For the first time, they were able to calculate a chemical weathering rate, which estimates how long it would take for rust to develop from the iron present in the meteorite rocks.

Published in the journal Nature Communications, the study found that it would take about 10 and about 10,000 times longer on Mars to reach the same levels of rust formation than in the deserts found on Earth. This means that the moisture present in Mars is much less than the moisture found even in the driest parts on Earth.

Mars lacks the needed moisture to support life today and it has been like that for millions of years.